


Hips

by soobadnoonecanstopher



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: F/M, Single Parent Kim Jongin | Kai, Teacher Kim Jongin | Kai
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:14:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28372197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soobadnoonecanstopher/pseuds/soobadnoonecanstopher
Summary: Jongin is surprised to learn that his peculiar new student, who has a habit of collecting things that don't belong to her, is actually the daughter of his neighbor, a hardworking single mother. When he recognizes the exercise shirt his neighbor is wearing, he finally has to speak up.Soundtrack:All songs by Stevie Wonder, 1.Sir Duke, 2. Superstition, 3. My Cherie Amour, 4. Higher Ground
Relationships: Kim Jongin | Kai/Reader, Kim Jongin | Kai/You
Kudos: 22





	1. Chapter 1

Soundtrack:  
  
All songs by Stevie Wonder,

[1\. Sir Duke](https://youtu.be/tH36ugGsy4M),  
[2\. Superstition](https://youtu.be/tXsxvdF481I),  
[3\. My Cherie Amour](https://youtu.be/b0Gu-CyE-NQ),  
[4\. Higher Ground](https://youtu.be/4wZ3ZG_Wams).

* * *

This wasn't quite what you had envisioned for your life. The laundry basket was heavy and balanced just on your hip and you gripped the tiny hand of your 6 year old daughter tightly with your other hand. You had only been living here for a week and a half, and the one thing you hadn't quite taken into account was managing the four flights of stairs with a clean load of laundry fresh from the first floor dryers.

The place was cheap enough for you to afford the two bedroom unit in a safe part of town and still be able to afford certain things like food and electricity on your income. Nari’s dance lessons came out of the support you received from your ex. You swore to yourself that no matter how tough things got, you would let her stay in the class she loved so much.

“Nari, stop jumping up the stairs, just walk normally.” You could feel your palm getting sweaty and you wanted to switch sides, but the girl was selective in her hearing. If you didn’t use your ‘mom voice’, she usually just did what she wanted.

The landing at the top flight of stairs was wet from that morning’s dew and you held her hand tightly as she jumped up to the final step, singing some song you hadn’t heard before and you sighed in a deep breath to finally see your front door fast approaching.

You folded clothing and put items neatly away, half paying attention to the noisy kid’s show on the tv, half paying attention to the time on the clock that told you Nari had only forty minutes before dance class and she hadn't yet had a bath or lunch.

Baths and lunches were a necessity for Nari, yet a luxury for you.  
She was squeaky clean and well fed and you hastily tied up your wet hair from the quickest shower of your life into a messy, wet blob on top of your head and grabbed a random t shirt from the stack of clean clothes and pulled it over your head. The cut off crusts you shoved into your mouth as you made her sandwich would have to do for nutrition. You simply didn't have time for anything else.

“Mommy my tights are itchy,” she complained from the backseat as she raked her nails over the clinging fabric covering her thighs and you pulled into the parking lot of the dance studio.

The clock in your car told you that in some surprising personal record, you were only five minutes late.

Nari jumped and bounced her way up the driveway, through the front door and down the hallway to the dance room where the sounds of children’s laughter and movement filtered through the closed door.

Through the door she bolted, disappearing into a small crowd of kids.

You stood, just inside the room, lingering just long enough to catch the instructor before the lessons began. You needed to make a payment for the last month of classes and you had finally settled the matter with your ex. You were eternally grateful that the old woman who ran the studio was willing to work with you until you could secure the payment.

The door behind you burst open and you moved to the side to avoid being trampled by a giggling little girl who seemed to be Nari’s age. The children parted and you saw your daughter embrace the newcomer in excitement.

“Nina,” a man’s voice shouted from the open doorway, “What did I say about running in here?”

You turned to the sound and caught his profile as he rushed through the door. You recognized the desperate look in his eyes. The look of a nagging parent needing to be heard by their misbehaving child and he clenched his jaw down hard as he scanned the room for the child.

“Of course she isn't listening to me. Nari is here. She never listens when Nari is here to listen to instead. Why do I even--” He caught you standing at the doorway next to him and his eyes widened in surprise, but his mouth kept running, “--bother?” The last word came out as a whisper.

An adorable whisper dear lord, who is this handsome man and why were you staring? You stared at his face for a few seconds longer because why not, you were already trapped by wide eyes and those pouty lips and broad, chiseled arms with, sweet jesus, muscles? Who even had muscles any more? What?

“Hello,” he said quietly and you tried to remember why you came.

You nodded your head.

Was that the best you could do? A nod? He didn't ask a question, he said hello you dummy. Who even had muscles like this? Why did he have them and why didn't he wear a real shirt that covered things like sexy muscles?  
  
You instantly felt disgruntled.

“Uhh, I’m Mr. Kim,” of course he was Mr. Kim. The cute ones were always Mr. Kim. You angled your eyes at his now outstretched hand, as if taking it for a handshake was somehow admitting just how sexy this man was.

“...the dance instructor, are you one of my parents?”

One of his? Were you his? He was the teacher here so yes, you must be his.

Oh no, he was still waiting for you to act like a normal person. You shot your hand out and grabbed his too hard and too fast and he seemed to flinch in surprise at your sudden movement. Maybe he was just jumpy but the small blush you saw on his pretty face, impossibly, made him look less like a sexy beast, and more like a cute little puppy.

“Yes, I’m Nari’s mom. I have to make a payment.” You held up your checkbook with a small smile and he gripped your hand and shook his own up and down slowly as his eyes seemed to travel around your face. And lower, what? Where was he looking? You stiffened when you were sure you saw his eyes down on your chest, was this man checking you out right now? In a room full of six year olds? With those muscles?

What should you do? This felt like a new situation to you, and you honestly were too stunned to move. Eventually the blatant staring he was doing right where your breasts sat changed and he narrowed his eyes to a squint and cocked his head to the right.

Okay that was enough.

Staring was one thing, but squinting? Who the hell did he think he was?

“Come into the office and you can make your payment.” He said with his eyes still no where near your face and when he looked up he probably noticed the very obvious heat that covered your face.

He was walking ahead of you and the noise of the children filled your head as you moved further into the room. There was a loud clapping of hands from the man walking in front of you and you watched in amazement as the mass of children disbursed into neat little obedient rows before your very eyes.

Even Nari, the least obedient of the children you were sure, fell in line when she heard that clap.

“Stretches!” He shouted at the group and they immediately bent down together, reaching for their toes.

You signed with a flourish on your payment, covering the next two months of classes as well as the balance due for last month and he hastily scribbled out a receipt for you. From the decor on the wall, you could see family pictures that you hadn't paid attention to before. The old woman who usually took your payment rushed you out quickly so you wouldn't be late for work and you hadn't a chance to actually see any of the pictures.

With him standing in front of you now, you could easily recognize the wide smile on the wall behind him. A picture, obviously years old with his smiling face, wide and beautiful, holding a small baby up for the camera to see. From where you stood it was clear to see that someone had been cut off of the other side of the photo, right after where the baby was shown. Someone with long black hair that made the picture now seem lopsided and off balance with her absence.

“Can I ask you why you are wearing my shirt?” Mr. Kim spoke up suddenly after you had tucked the receipt in between the pages of your checkbook and you looked down at the shirt you wore, confused as to why he would be saying such a thing when you had very obviously just gotten dressed at your own home with your own clothing fresh from the dryer at your new apartment building.

What the hell was this shirt? You looked up with wide eyes before you looked down again seeing very clearly that you wore a very soft, very worn in grey t shirt with what appeared to be a design for a 2008 Lifeguard Competition and the faded markings of where someone had written in a name with a big black sharpie. Barely legible from the years of washings you could make out the letters when you pulled the fabric away from your belly and stretched it out.

It was upside down, but it definitely read “Kim Jongin” and you looked back up into his questioning face with that feeling coursing through your head. You know that feeling...the one that feels like death.

“I--” your mouth was open and your lips were trying to speak but why were you wearing this shirt?

“Are you Kim Jongin?” You searched your memory of this morning. Rushing to get ready, reaching into the stack of freshly washed clothes you pulled out a t shirt and put it on without actually looking at it.

He nodded his head and the way he stood just behind the desk with his arms over his chest made his biceps pop and strain against the fabric of his shirt.

“I have no idea why I am wearing your shirt.” It was the truth. You didn't know how it got into your laundry and you definitely didn't know how it just so happened to be on your body right now without you even noticing for one second that you were wearing the very worn, very very comfy t shirt that belonged to this sexy man who was now chewing on his bottom lip as he looked through the glass window where rows of children stretched.

He moved from behind the desk and leaned through the doorway.

“Nari will you come in here for a minute please.” The children erupted in hoots and you watched as your daughter put her head down and made her way in between kids toward the office.

Her eyes went wide to see you standing at the desk and you saw the glance she made down at the shirt you wore.

Her wide eyes went to Mr. Kim’s eyes and you could feel your own heart pounding inside your chest and you watched the tall man as he slowly lowered himself down to her level and squatted on his heels.

You weren't sure what you were expecting as you held your breath, waiting for the man to begin speaking to your daughter.

“Nari, honey did you borrow something of mine again?” His voice was soft and he reached his hand out to hold on to hers as she bit down on her top lip and pouted her bottom lip out. She gave a tiny nod and looked into his eyes as he smiled a tiny bit.

“Remember what I said? You can borrow anything you like, but you should tell me about it so I don't worry that I lost it. Okay?” His hand rubbed lightly over her own and he reached out a hand to cup her face lightly. You saw the small tremble in her bottom lip and his smile widened.

“No no, you’re okay. Just tell me next time okay?” His eyebrows lifted with the promise and he held up his pinky finger for Nari to take. With a small sniffle she reeled in her emotions at being caught in her misdeed, and agreed with his promise.

You watched in awe. Your mouth might have even been open. There were no loud voices, no threats, no shouting, nothing scary that you might have heard from your ex husband in this situation, but somehow...this approach seemed to have a much greater impact on your daughter. She quickly turned and moved to the spot where the kids had their cubbies with various personal belongings and ran back to Mr. Kim holding a small toy in her hand.

She held it out to him and you recognized the pink frog that she often played with on your living room floor. You knew from the tantrums she threw when she accidentally left it behind that it was one of her favorite toys. The cheap thing must have cost a whole two cents to make, yet she had a strange attachment to things you would never quite understand.

“Here. You can borrow hoppy for tonight if you want.” She spoke in a sweet voice and Mr. Kim reached out with his mouth in an exaggerated surprised face as he picked up the tiny piece of plastic from her palm.

“Are you sure? What if I play with him all night?”

“He can take it. He's a good hopper.” And with that she was off, bolting through the children to take her place next to Nina and resume the stretching for the class.

He carefully deposited the pink frog onto the corner of the desk where you saw a cell phone and a set of keys sitting and you wondered if he would really take the toy home with him tonight.

“You can stay and watch if you want.” He paused at the doorway and looked back where you stood staring at that damn photograph on the wall. The one with the bright smiling face of Mr. Kim Jongin and the tiny baby girl in a picture frame and the missing other half that, the closer you looked, you noticed the photo had the distinct markings of being torn out, rather than neatly cut with scissors.

When you turned away from the image that seemed to speak volumes, while filling your curiosity with countless questions alike, he was gone.

“Okay free dance time!” He shouted over the children's heads and they cheered as he trotted over to a stereo in the corner to turn on some music.

A familiar funky upbeat soul song [(1)](https://youtu.be/tH36ugGsy4M) played over the speakers in the ceiling. A song you hadn't heard in years but always brought a smile to your face. Perhaps it was the sight before you that brought the smile. The children began moving their bodies, some very wildly like Nari swung their limbs and moved all over the place, others grabbed hands with classmates and danced to the beat together.

“To the beat! Listen to the song while you dance or I won't do it.” Mr. Kim shouted over the song. Some kids who had been moving too fast out of sync with the beat of the song looked up into his face and slowed their bodies, eventually nodding heads or kicking their legs as they found their own rhythms. The proud mother in you watched as Nari danced some unconventional jig exactly on beat to the song and despite the strange kicks and punches, she had a good sense of the beat.

Perhaps she got it from you. You nodded your head to the song as the children wound down some of their excitement of being free to express themselves.

The song ended and immediately after the track a new one started and the children all stopped in their tracks and turned to face Mr. Kim. You noticed they seemed to make a big circle as they watched him and you watched too, curious as to what they were waiting for.

“Okay okay, my turn.” He said with a wide smile that you caught just the edges of and something about the man who stood in the center of the room seemed to shift.

Their faces were glued to him and you didn't blame them. He changed his posture and lifted one hand to his hip, the other hand rose to snap to the beat of the song [(2)](https://youtu.be/tXsxvdF481I) that played and nearly instantly the change you saw in his countenance took over entirely. The song started with only a beat, and he felt it in his bones. You saw his head nod, his shoulders shift and sway and soon the rest of his body followed.

This...this person wasn't adorable blushing sweet Mr. Kim, not at all. His hips moved freely, his legs danced expertly, carrying his body along in smooth motions. Was his spine even connected to his body? How in the world was it possible for so much fluid movement from a real human? You stared, again probably with your mouth open. With each new beat of the song, you could practically feel in your chest the movements of his body, his arms, the expressions on his face that told a story, the way he slowed and closed his eyes and the fast spins as he moved through the room, eventually grabbing the hands of a few of the children to bring them along through the musical journey.

Your eyes widened further and you closed your open mouth when you realized that he was too close to where you stood like a statue at the back of the room, clutching your checkbook and your car keys against your chest for dear life.

His hands released the child he had in his grip and his eyes zeroed in on yours for exactly one second before you felt his warm hand grab yours and you yelped out in genuine shock.

You heard your car keys hit the floor behind you and your legs were moving whether you wanted them to or not.

“Um, I’m not--” you complained through gritted teeth and his own smile widened to near incapacitating levels. How many teeth does this guy have? “--very good at this--” your words were barely audible over the music and the cheering sound from the children who giggled and clapped all around you.

“Dancers! Let's tell Nari’s mommy what we always say,” His eyes stayed focused on yours as he shouted to the children around the room. You heard a collective inhale before the children all shouted in unison.

 _”Always try your best!”_ Their voices echoed around the big empty room and you tried your best not to roll your damn eyes.

He pulled harder at your hand and the force caught you off guard. You stumbled right where he wanted you and you felt your own chest collide against his firm chest before you settled your legs and found yourself in a semi-embrace with the man, his body heat actually noticeable through the thin t shirt you wore with his very name written on it. An arm wrapped loosely around your waist and the tips of his fingertips applying just enough pressure against your skin to tell you exactly where you should move.

The man must be made entirely of magic, because your legs moved to the beat of the song and you didn't step on his feet once.

He pulled away from you with a grin on his lips and you saw him popping his shoulders sexily before he leaned in and whispered a command to you.

“You do it,” he said lowly and when he pulled away again you felt the light touch of his fingertips along your hip.

What choice did you have? You popped your shoulders, giving a little shake to the beat of the song and the man bit down on his lip lightly, giving you possibly the most inappropriate look you had ever received from a member of the opposite sex in your entire life. And it happened in front of your daughter and all of her friends.

“Yeah,” he said in victory and then he winked at you and you were done. The exasperated scoff that left your chest was the anthem of your doneness.

Your smile was wide, but in your chest you felt the undeniable, and completely inappropriate direction your thoughts wanted to take.

Luckily the song was over and the children rushed to the center of the dance floor for the actual start of the lesson.

You felt like you might just collapse as you meandered your way through tiny bodies back to your spot at the back of the room. You bent to collect the things he had simply tossed away in favor of the dance and when you stood you could feel something...or someone. Whatever it was it felt exactly like you were being watched. You spun and were greeted only with the back of the man. His broad shoulders connected to lifted arms and he bowed deeply to the room of attentive students as he began his lesson.

Today was one of the few days that you didn't have to rush off to work after dropping Nari off at dance and you decided with the class nearly halfway through you could simply wait it out and sit in on the class. It was obvious that Jongin--uhh Mr. Kim didn't mind having you in the room and every now and then you would meet his eye from somewhere across the room as he straightened an arm, or corrected a toe point, or lifted a chin.

Each time it happened he would smile a tiny smile and quickly return to the class and by the end of the class you must have let your guard down a bit too much because how long had you actually been staring at his face as he moved around the room now? You felt as if you had been pulled into a trance and when he clapped his hands to pull everyone's attention to him once more you snapped to attention and straightened your posture.

The bench you had been sitting on made your ass feel a bit numb and you rose to your feet to stretch a bit.

“Okay one more song. What should we dance to?” He was speaking and you could see how much calmer everyone in the room was. Perhaps they were finally free of all of the excess energy that kids had. You knew Nari always slept like a log on the days when she had dance class.

“Dance with Nari’s mommy again!” A tiny voice from the back shouted and Mr. Kim turned his head in the direction of the voice.

“With Nari’s mommy?” He said with a slight upward inflection to his voice that wasn't there before. He pivoted his torso to look back at you with a mischievous smile on his face. The group gave their approval.

“Is Nari’s mommy a good dancer?” He said and the the kids giggled and cheered as he made his way with a little skip in his step toward where you stood with your damn keys and checkbook still in your hands.

This time, you gave in to the urge to roll your eyes when he bowed deeply in front of you with his hand outstretched and lifted into the air.

“May I have this dance?” You set your things down on the bench and placed your fingertips into the palm of his outstretched hand, ignoring the high pitched giggles you heard from the room at your agreement.

He placed a hand inside his pocket and you saw a remote that he aimed at the stereo in the room and you felt the warmth of his living body when he leaned in to whisper into your ear.

“Don't worry. You’ll only be mine for two minutes and fifty-three seconds.”

It was a short song. You sighed as you stepped into him, a strange mix of relief that the song was so short and regret that the song was so short hitting you at the same time and the first notes of Stevie Wonder’s _My Cherie Amour_[(3)](https://youtu.be/b0Gu-CyE-NQ) began to play overhead.

“Not enough time to fall in love then.” You whispered mostly to yourself, taken aback that you would dare say such a thing out loud with a complete stranger so close to you.

He didn't respond and you hoped he hadn't heard you.

This song was much slower than the first song you danced to and he mostly lead you around, pausing to spin you at certain moments in the song. After each spin or dip you felt his arms constrict as he pulled you in closer again, closer and closer and by the end of the song you could feel the thumping of his heartbeat against your chest. Your own breathing was faster, despite the casual slow dance that required very little effort at all.

His hand which splayed out over your back, high up between your shoulder blades had been slipping and when you looked up into his face you could see the strange focus he had while he danced.

His face was expressive, expertly showing the emotions of the songs and this, very obviously a love song seemed to pull the emotions to the surface as he held the eye contact with you. You looked down at his mouth when you caught movement and noticed that he was mouthing the words with his focus on your face.

And the hips. This song was about the hips and he made you sway yours along with his and soon the song was winding down and fading away, leaving you with your hips still pressed up against his own when the music stopped and the silence took over the room.

His eyes were still on yours and your heartbeat pounded noisily inside your ears. Nearly too loudly for you to catch his next words but the quiet whisper you heard against your ear was just loud enough for you to make out.

“That was plenty of time.”

The kids were clapping and jumping in excitement around you and you felt his arms release their hold they once held so strongly.

The class was over now and the energy seemed to return to the group as they chatted and laughed with each other and left one by one as parents arrived to retrieve them.

Nari pulled the arm of a little girl, the same one you remember arriving with a burst of movement through the door and she looked into your eyes with hopeful excitement.

“Mommy can Nina have dinner with us at our house?”

Two sets of big brown begging eyes looked up at you, as cute and as sweet as could be.

“What does Nina’s daddy say?” A throat cleared behind you and you turned to catch the big brown eyes or Mr. Kim.

“Nina’s daddy says not tonight, but maybe next time.”

You were familiar with this sort of answer. It was the hopeful promise of next time to stave off a tantrum and both girls frowned dramatically at being turned down. Honestly you frowned as well, only, because you were an adult and used to disappointment, yours was well concealed behind a flat hand that rested over your mouth as you looked away from him.

“But Daddy,” Nina was complaining, “you said that the last time.”

When you turned to face them you were surprised to see him watching you with some unreadable expression on his face, seemingly oblivious that hand was being pulled and shook as the girl complained noisily.

What was he doing? Why was he wavering? Didn't he know that the first rule of parenting was holding your ground? If he gave in to her begging now she would only learn that begging works if she does it well enough and for a long enough time, she will win.

You widened your eyes at the man and shook your head in question.

He stared at your face, deep in his own thoughts for a half a second more before he seemed to snap out of it and focus his vision, lifting his eyebrows and looking down at the little girl who was winding down now, giving up the fight and learning to cope with a life full of unavoidable disappointments.

It was a good lesson to learn. She couldn't always get her way. Nari had given up a few minutes back and was spinning in a circle singing some song you didn't recognize.

“I always say that,” he whispered suddenly to you and you looked into his face with those same wide eyes as you leaned your head in slightly to hear his small confession, parent to parent.

“Every time she has a friend, she wants to go over and I say ‘maybe next time’ and then we never do it.” He sounded sad as he spoke into your ear and you looked down at the little girl who had linked hands together with Nari as they both spun in a circle, singing the same song together. “W-What if I’m failing as her only parent?”

“She can come for dinner. I really don't mind. How much does a kid that size eat anyway? Maybe one..two pieces of chicken? It really makes no difference to me.” You shrugged your face and your shoulders and everything else you could possibly shrug in the most casual way humanly possible. Because you were casual right? Super casual. So what if he didn't take you up on your offer and you went home alone and you ordered double the chicken and ate it all yourself at night after Nari fell asleep, crying into the pile of bones that symbolized your collapsed life.

“Chicken?” He said in an adorable little whine and his eyebrows knitted together above his blinking eyes. “I...love chicken.” He added very quietly to himself and you felt a burst of laughter escape your carefully constructed composure. You coughed to cover it and he looked at you again out of the sides of his eyes with a grumpy pout on his face.

His lips frowned and he lifted his chin defiantly.

“She can't eat chicken without me. It's a rule.” The pout on his face was impressive, as was the slight whine you heard in his voice and you laughed again when you caught the tiny tremble at the edges of his lips as a smile struggled to fight through the fit.

You pulled out your phone and opened a new text message, keying in your address quickly you handed the phone over to him and he looked down at it for a few seconds before he realized what was happening.

“But this is my address. Did you just move into the building? A four story walk up next to the park?” His eyes lit up with wonder and you looked into that face with an equally surprised expression.

“Are we neighbors?” He said after a moment of your silence and you let out a surprised laugh that pulled a smile onto his face at the odds.

“What number do you live in?” You finally asked once you found your voice again.

“405,” he said with a smile.

“--unbelievable..” you shook your head. What the hell kind of twist of fate was this? The girls were hugging now, having noticed that the dance studio was completely empty now except for you and Mr. Kim who, it seemed was lost in some thoughts of his own as he stared at you again.

Strangely, it seemed, the staring didn't really bother you once he'd done it a few times already, this short meeting seemed to bring with it a sort of familiarity with his ways.

“Guess we will see you at home then.” He said softly and you felt a wave of nerves flood over your body with his choice of words. The intimate way he said the word ‘home’ felt terrifying and wonderful all at once.

He really showed up that night. Freshly showered, wearing a button up long sleeve shirt and black slacks, smelling like a goddamn bottle of shaving cream and toothpaste and looking like every late night fantasy you'd ever allowed yourself indulge in.

Nina and Nari disappeared into your daughter’s bedroom, all giggles, singing, dancing, and mischief and you sat down to chicken delivery and cold beer with a real life adult man who could use big words and hold a mature conversation. There wasn't a single made up song, imaginary friend, or fart joke to be found.

And just like that, a new tradition was born. Mr. Kim and Nina came over after dance practice, and sometimes just because Nina was bored at home and driving him crazy with the songs and you’d find them at your door with some sort of culinary peace offering.

The conversation was usually light, until questions about the past heartbreaks and broken homes began floating around.

When you said “oh you know how it is,” he always knew how it was. And when he said “it's a long story” you knew just how long. Eventually you grew tired of shaking your head and rolling your eyes with a sheepish smile.

Perhaps it was the cold beer, or the warmth you saw in his eyes when Nari rushed into the room and called him ‘Daddy’ by accident, after listening to Nina talk about the man all evening long.

“Sorry, she gets worked up,” you offered and he just stared at you with those unassuming and unjudging eyes.

“Truth is, she sees her father every other weekend and trust me when I say the man is nothing like you.” Did you detect a little bitterness in your voice? “Although she probably sees his assistant more than him.”

You longed for a change in the subject suddenly, not wanting to get into the painful details of the cheating and the fighting about his money. The last thing you wanted to do was unload all of your baggage on this handsome man with the sweet smile and even sweeter eyes.

Even if he did tend to stare too much.

“What about Nina’s mother? Is she still around?” He had never brought her up, and something about the photos you saw where she was torn out told you that even though the subject may be touchy, she probably didn’t leave this earth in any way that made him want to remember her. In fact, you were pretty sure she was still alive, with the tales Nina told about her living in a far off country as a ballerina princess.

He looked down.

The man with the never ending deep stare looked down at his half finished beer bottle and you felt like an asshole.

“I'm sor--”  
“She--” he interrupted your apology and his thumb picked at the label on his bottle, “--she has visitations every weekend. According to our custody agreement. She's showed up exactly three times in all.”

When he looked back up into your eyes you could see it. The hurt in them was peeking its ugly head up and you reached a hand out to lay over his.

The picking at the label stopped and he looked down at the back of your hand.

“When we got pregnant, I pushed her to keep the baby. I was thrilled with the idea but..” he licked his lips and lifted his bottle with the other hand for a drink.

“I mean, I get it. It wasn't my body. She was a dancer and having a child would ruin her, she said. It was selfish of me--” his hand was trembling and you reached your other hand forward to hold it still.

“She resented me for that and we never recovered. She isn't in Nina’s life. The few visitations she has actually showed up for, fill me with a sort of mind numbing terror that I can't quite describe. Seeing my baby walk away with her is like living inside of a nightmare that I can't wake up from until I have her back.”

You watched his face as he relived the emotions and years of pain he had to endure from his past.

You gave him silence. You could feel his hand within yours as the trembling stopped and he eventually gripped tightly around yours and he came back to life and finished the remains of his beer.

When he finally looked up into your eyes the warmth was returning and he blinked slowly at you. You gave him a tiny smile and blinked slowly at him and he inhaled a deep chest filling breath that took a long time to empty out of his chest.

“Do you want to dance with me?” He said softly and you sat back in your chair and widened your smile.

He pushed back from the table, placed his empty bottle with the group of other empties on your kitchen counter and went to your tv to turn on the speakers there. You saw him swiping through something on his phone and in a second he was connected. When his visits became a regular thing, a big Bluetooth speaker was one of the first things he brought over. He said things like this were as necessary as a refrigerator and a stove to him.

You heard the first notes of a quick funk track [(4)](https://youtu.be/4wZ3ZG_Wams) playing through your speakers and he began slowly nodding his head to the beat. You pushed back from the table and rose to your feet, quite unsure of what you were supposed to do without his leading, you hung back. The lyrics sang out, preaching about a life that kept on moving despite the various powers against. It was a song about keeping on and you couldn't help but admire the symbolism in both your life and his.

His shoulders moved, his hips, of course those hips swung with a sort of disconnect from the rest of him and his hands hung limply in between parted legs. When his hands moved their direction was anything but a childish dance he did around his kids, this was definitely something you hadn't quite expected from him when he said he wanted to dance.

His sense of the beat was impeccable of course, not that you expected anything else from Kim Jongin, but you found yourself watching him in a near hypnotic state.

Maybe you were drunk.  
When a hand moved closer to that space between his legs you looked up into his face, suddenly aware that you had just watched him grab himself for the sake of the dance and you were shocked to see his that eyes were open and on your face.

You wanted to look away. Everything in your body wanted to turn away but you felt trapped. When he tilted his head back, his eyes rolled up into his head and his lids closed, transforming his expression from one of a sinful predatory look to one that seemed more like pure ecstasy. The wide smile you saw flash across his face made you gasp and you felt hot all of a sudden.

“You said you would dance with me, come here.” His words broke through just over the sound of the music but his hips were swinging and those hands were still running around sinful places.

Did he mean like this? Dance with him like this? Your face must have betrayed your mild panic and you looked behind you to the bedroom where your daughter and her best friend played together in the sweet innocent land of make believe.

When you turned back to look at him, he was much closer than you expected and you felt his hands reach out and grab ahold of your hands and pull.

Your legs moved, stiffly yes, but you gave in pretty easily. When you felt his hands land right on your hips you looked down, trying to find the beat, trying to find the rhythm you knew you should have in your mind somewhere, when you were dancing but his hands were on your hips and sweet lord did he smell good up close.

His palms pushed harder against your hips and you moved sluggishly and stifled a small giggle.

“So stiff,” he said quietly with a smile and you finally gave in, loosening up your joints a bit with the encouraging pressure of his hands.

“Good girl,” he said against your ear. You were pretty sure hyperventilating wasn’t a good dance move. You half wondered if he had ever seen a grown woman faint right in his arms while dancing. Actually, with the way this guy looked, it was probably an everyday occurrence for him. How long was this damn song?

“Look at me while you’re dancing with me,” he said with a tiny tap under your chin.

You lifted your chin and looked into his eyes and instantly regretted it. The sweet warmth of Mr. Kim had vanished long ago and this look was the dance. This look was the drunkenness you saw in him brought on by the song and the motions and the closeness of this makeshift dance floor in the middle of your livingroom and once you were caught by those eyes you knew you had lost whatever flimsy bit of control you believed you had in this situation.

You couldn't help but dance. He was addicting and he wanted you to dance so you did what he wanted. You gave in to the song, moving along with the beat of the song, feeling every single bit of it in your joints and your bones and in your hips and when your felt his hands leave their controlling perch and travel down the length of your thighs before leaving your skin entirely. You hadn't realized that you had closed your eyes until you heard a low groan from him that pulled your focus back to his face.

His eyes were hooded and he watched you through heavy breaths puffing out through parted lips. The sight made you bite down on your bottom lip to keep from doing something worse with your mouth. He felt this. You knew he could feel exactly what you were feeling with this dance.

“That’s it, make me crazy,” he said in a low voice and his hands were back, as was the heat of his body against yours. He moved with you, pulling at your legs, making you straddle his thighs and the heat you felt drove you to search for more.

Hot fingertips dug into the flesh of your hip, high enough for your biology teacher to consider it your ass if you were being quite honest and your knee rubbed against something warm and hard between his legs that told you exactly what kind of effect you had on him.

As quickly as it began, the song ended. It was a short song. Why did he always pick the short ones? Why couldn't you have this hours? Your eyes were closed and you could feel the beating of his heart against your chest. His hands at the small of your back, and on your ass gradually relaxed their grip and you could feel the delicate effects of the spell wearing off as he took tiny a step back and away from you.

You pulled yourself together and took a step back too. Carefully opening your eyes to get a look at his face. He was breathing hard and steady and his eyes were cast down on the floor. His cheeks were pink and his lips parted as he blinked and came back into himself once again.

“Its getting late,” he said after a moment of tense silence.

You nodded your head. He lived literally seconds away and often stayed over later than was probably appropriate for the kind of relationship you two had.

“Nina,” he said in a louder voice, breaking through the noisy laughter you heard coming from your daughter’s room. “It's time to go home, now.”

This, you had honestly expected. He was always skittish with touching and lingering, despite the attraction you know you felt and you were pretty sure he was feeling too. Now that he had been thoroughly spooked, he was running scared.

And you would let him go. What choice did you have?

“Thank you for the beer,” he said as he gathered his child and stuck his phone into his back pocket. You forced a smile and nodded your head, waving goodbye to Nina who smiled widely by his side.

He held her hand tightly and you noticed she squirmed in his grip until she broke free and in a flash of motion she ran up to you and wrapped her arms tightly around your waist.

“Oh,” you said in surprise and quickly squatted down so you could return the hug tightly. You felt her turn her head and place a tiny kiss against your cheek and your eyes widened as you looked up into Jongin’s eyes when it happened.

“Come on Nina. Let's go. It's late.” He said in voice that sounded much too serious for a small kiss goodbye and you tried your best not to feel the sting against your heart as your front door slammed shut and the sound echoed around your now empty living room.


	2. Chapter 2

He couldn't stay away from you forever right?

If anything, Nina couldn't stay away from Nari forever.

After the dance in your living room, after feeling the tension and his hands and his heart beating frantically inside of his chest once that music stopped, after feeling the undeniable attraction you were certain wasn't only on your side, he didn't return to your door for four whole days.  
  
You could practically picture him holed up inside his apartment with the whining begging little girl who just didn't understand why she could come play with her best friend like she had grown so used to. What was he even doing in there? Exercising? Dancing? Sitting on his couch eating mountains of chicken by himself? The thought of Kim Jongin enjoying that delicious chicken from the delivery place down the street without you filled you with some sort of feeling. Was it anger? Was it jealousy? You couldn’t? Sure he had told you that Nina wasn’t allowed to eat chicken without him, but at this point, all of the chicken he had consumed had been with you. Wasn't a new, and much better rule that Jongin couldn't eat chicken without you? You scowled to yourself. Annoyed by all that hypothetical and very delicious chicken. Annoyed that he would run away so quickly the second things got even remotely interesting.

You understood. Of course you did. This was scary. Even now as you stood in front of the spinning dryer watching the clothes tumble around and around inside the hot grey box the direction your mind drifted was to him.

You could still feel the warmth of his hands still on your hips. You could still see the smirk on his face and that look in his eyes as he pulled you roughly by the knee and slipped a firm thigh directly between your legs as you both moved in time to the music that played around your bodies.

Even worse than the physical effect he had on your body was the pang you felt in your heart when you saw the pain and the hurt he had been through. Perhaps you had been better equipped to handle the pain. Sure, you had been hurt in the past, but the scars had eventually healed themselves once you accepted the fact that sometimes things just don't work out. Sometimes disappointment is inevitable, but that didn't mean that you couldn't ever love again. In fact, the fullness you felt inside your heart when you looked at the smiling face of your daughter was evidence that you still had the capacity for love. And you would be damned if you would run scared from it just because you had been burned in the past.

The dryer beeped and the load of clothing slowed to a stop behind the glass door.

You pulled the door open and stared at the top of the pile and you saw it. Scrawled in faded black marker, barely legible the letters on that shirt that you shamelessly had not yet returned to him.

‘Kim Jongin’

It was a soft shirt and he hadn't yet asked for it back. How many wash cycles had you seen it go through, each time telling yourself this would be the time you'd return it to him and apologize for keeping it for so long.

The clothes were in the basket and you reached for Nari’s hand for the long trek up the stairs. And at the top of the landing, instead of turning right as you usually did, you took a left and you found yourself standing in front of his door.

Nari jumped in excitement and you knocked lightly against the wood.

After a few breaths you heard locks click on the inside and the door was pulled open.

“Oh, uhh...” he stammered when he saw you and you recognized the awkward nervous expression on his face. You'd seen it a few times by now. When Nina or Nari would rush up behind him and push him against you as you walked and his hand would brush against yours. His cheeks would redden and he would grow flustered and shy.

His attention was drawn below to the child at your side that trembled with excitement.

“Oh hi Nari,” he said with a wide beautiful smile, “Nina is in her room if you want to go play.” Your hand was empty in an instant and he stepped aside to let her pass. When he turned back to face you you'd already pulled the shirt off the top of your laundry basket and tossed it in his arms.

He must have been surprised because you heard the small grunt of surprise as he quickly caught it. Of course he wasn't only sexy, sweet, graceful, and thoughtful, but he also had fantastic reflexes too.

“Sorry it took so long to return it,” you said after a moment and his eyes were down on the shirt he held in one hand. He chewed on his bottom lip for a moment before he looked back up at you and quickly reached out to grab the basket of your clean laundry from your arms.

He silently turned his back, taking an assortment of your clean clothes, including several pairs of bras and underwear deep into his home without so much as a word or explanation.

“Uhh--” you could feel the panic bubbling up to the surface? “J-Jong--Mr.Kim that's my laundry.”

“Are you still calling me Mr. Kim?” You heard him mumble from far ahead of you in his apartment and you quickly rushed inside when you saw him plop down on his living room floor, sitting cross legged with your laundry basket in front of him.

On the very top of the pile, just below where his shirt had sat so warm and grey and cozy was a pair of your panties, which he instantly reached for and folded in half, laying them on the floor next to his knee. You felt an overwhelming urge to dig yourself a hole right here in his living room and disappear into the center of the earth. Kim Jongin just touched your panties. Sure, they were clean, but they weren't even fancy panties. They were extremely unsexy cotton things that had seen at least six months worth of washing. Why was he doing this? Couldn't he not do this and save you the mortification? Oh god, what if he found the single pair of thong underwear you owned? Did you wash those this time? You tried to recall if you wore them recently and you saw him looking down into that damn basket again.

He dug through the basket, reaching for another item of clothing he came out with a shirt of yours which he quickly folded and sat on the other side of him.

“Come and help me, dont just stand there.” Were you just standing there? Honestly you were mortified, he was folding your sports bra in half and when you looked at his face he didn't look the least bit bothered by it. His face was as blank as could be and you pulled your mouth shut and forced yourself to examine him a little closer. Was he really unaffected by this? By you?

Perhaps that attraction you thought you saw in the small touches and the glances and the staring, not to mention the fucking dancing, perhaps you had imagined all of that.

You plopped yourself down in a bit of a huff and began grabbing at items from the basket to fold. You both worked through the stack quickly and as he carefully placed the neatly folded stacks of clothing you saw him reach for the grey shirt you had just returned to him, fold it quickly and place it right on the top of your basket of laundry.

“You can keep this. It looks good on you.” He said it quietly and looked down at his empty hands that were suddenly out of something to fold.

The tiny, nonchalant way he eked out that compliment as if he hadn't’ just floored you again with his words made you want to scream. And clap, and laugh and probably do a dance that would embarrass you. Yet you used every bit of self control in your body not to react to it.

Jongin said it looked good on you.  
Jongin looked at you in his shirt, with his name on it, and he thought ‘this looks good on her.’  
You could feel your arms vibrating with the effort it took to not grab him by the collar and shake him because, god damnit, that shirt looked good on you!

He wrung his hands together, staring down at those hands and you watched his face closely until it finally dawned on you that something felt off. Despite the small celebration happening inside your own head, Jongin seemed to be down about something. If not down, then definitely different than the usual casual, happy go lucky man who was as comfortable around you as your own family was.

Something was definitely wrong with him and the usual carefree way he watched you and focused almost obsessively on your face as you spoke was gone. He was avoiding your eyes, or, your face entirely. Everytime he would look up into your eyes it was quick and he was looking down in an instant.

“Jongin,” you said quietly, both trying to get him to look at you and trying his name out on your lips for once.

He looked up at you and all at once you felt overwhelmed when he didn't drop his eyes quickly.

He swallowed and you stared at his face, keeping up the eye contact for as long as you could stand.

“Hmm?” He said in a soft hum and you saw a single eyebrow dance on his forehead.

“I’m sorry if I did something to make you uncomfortable.” You said quietly and his eyes widened a tiny bit before he bit down on his bottom lip and exhaled a breath through his nose.

He shook his head and you saw his countenance change as his brows knitted together and he wrinkled his nose.

“You didn't do anything. I’m just--” you could see the struggle he was facing with his words as plain as day on his face. It was no wonder he couldn't get them out with the war he was fighting inside his head.

He didn't finish his sentence. And you felt as if you were holding your breath as you waited for what felt like ages in absolute silence.

The silence felt all consuming. Part of you wanted to embrace it. There was so little silence that you had in your life that the moment you realized it, you had already been swallowed up by it.

Your mind was drifting when you felt it. A bit of warmth, the feeling of the flesh of another human being touching you. Laid warmly over the back of your hand you felt the soft warmth of his palm as he laid his hand directly over yours and yet, the wandering in your mind was distracting because this house, this place was entirely too silent.

“Do you hear that?” You asked him quietly and his eyes seemed to wander over your face for a few passes until you saw a switch turn and he sat up straighter, instantly more alert.

“It's too quiet,” he said and he was instantly jumping to his feet. You were on his heels, instantly and acutely aware that as a parent, there was one truth you always lived by. The absolute worst situations always came from silence.

He was moving toward the bedroom where you knew Nari and Nina were playing noisily only seconds before and you stood just behind when you saw him peek his head through the doorway as his eyes searched the room.

His wide eyes relaxed and he exhaled a noisy sigh of relief at the same time as you reached the doorway and peered inside.

You saw a bit of a mess, but honestly nothing amiss other than a few crayon marks on the wood floor that a magic eraser would get right off. As if they noticed your presence, both girls looked up from their coloring session with wide questioning eyes before their focus turned back down to their pages.

“Hey, what are you drawing?” Nina was closest to you and you could see a few brightly colored stick figures linked together by their hands.

“My family,” she said with a shrug and she was giving the tallest figure a brown hairstyle that looked somewhat like the hair on Jongin’s head. As you dropped down to your knees you got a closer look and counted the figures.

Four. Two little girls, a dad and another person who didn't have any distinguishing features yet. Armed with her crayon you watched as she began shading in hair, adding a dress and a shirt to give you the idea that the person she drew was a woman.

“And who is this?” You said as you pointed down to the obvious woman who was holding on to Jongin’s hand in her picture.

From the corner of your eye you caught the way Jongin seemed to stiffen and cross his arms over his chest as he stood, still at the doorway, very clearly looking down a the picture his daughter drew. He was silent as a statue as he waited for Nina’s response.

“That’s mommy,” she said with a smile and you bit down on your bottom lip, a soft sigh came from Jongin at the door and when you looked up into his face you could see the tension in his face. He chewed on his lip roughly and his eyebrows looked furrowed, over troubled eyes.

You couldn't imagine the kind of pain that he must be feeling right now. Of course Nina would want to include her mother in her drawing of her family, yet the longer you looked at her drawing, the more puzzled you felt. In her drawing, the other little girl had long braids that looked exactly like the braids Nari wore right now and you pointed to the other little girl.

“Nari, my sister.” Nina said with her voice full of confidence and you looked back at the mother in her drawing.

“So if Nari is your sister, who is Mommy?” You frowned slightly when you realized that you wore a blue skirt and pink top just like the woman in her drawing.

“When you and my daddy get married, I’ll get a mommy and a sister.” She said clearly and you heard a small cough coming from the man who stood at the doorway. When you looked up you only caught his back as he left the room entirely.

You laid a warm hand over her head and smiled a tense smile at her face. She merely smiled and kept on working on her picture.

Where had he gone? Was he upset? Was he filled with a sick kind of hope in your belly at the mere possibility that Nina’s image for her future might come true? Or was that just you?

You left the room, heading back toward the living room to find him and as you passed the darkened hallway that led to the other bedroom you felt the warmth of a hand that reached out for yours.

Your feet stopped moving and you felt a very sudden rush of nerves. His hand shifted and moved lower, moving long fingers further inside the palm of your hand and your heart thumped noisily inside your ears as you closed your eyes and willed your nerves to settle down. When he spoke the sound was quiet and he whispered out your name. Not “Nari’s mommy” or some other polite form of your identity but your name, spoken with his tongue, in that soft whisper of his that sent goosebumps over your skin.

“C-Can I talk to you?”

He gave a small pull and you let your legs carry you into that darkened hallway that he had determined needed to be the setting of this conversation and as your eyes adjusted you could just barely make out the pinkness you were certain you saw in his cheeks.

The space in this hallway wasn't exactly expansive and with his hand still gripping yours, you definitely felt the warmth from his body. The warmth you saw in his eyes was doing things to send warmth through your chest as you looked into his eyes and waited for him to say what he brought you here to say.

After what felt like years of those brown eyes he finally closed them and exhaled a deep breath from his lungs and gave in to whatever gravity he had been fighting. He leaned his back against the wall of that hallway and dropped your hand that he had been just barely holding.

His hands rose and he rubbed them roughly over his face, pressing against his closed eyelids with his fingertips you heard a soft groan of frustration from behind those hands.

“Jongin, are you okay?” Frankly his silence was going on for too long and you were beginning to get desperate to get to the bottom of what was actually going on with him.

He shook his head behind his hands.

“No,” he said. It was muffled and immediately after he said the word you heard a small humorless laugh. It sounded hopeless, just like the sound of someone giving up on something.

“I’m...worried,” he said and finally he dropped those hands from his face and looked into your eyes. “That Nina is growing very attached to you, that she...loves you.”

You stared into his eyes, his captive audience, both by his gravity and by the enormous potential of his words. While the influx in his voice gave you the impression that he might not be done talking, the silence that followed gave you pause.

You swallowed away the dryness you felt in your mouth and nervously chewed on the inside of your cheek as you considered his words.

Was that it? His little girl felt attached to you, the first maternal figure she had ever been exposed to for longer than a week, and he was surprised that she clung to you suddenly? What was he so worried about? You were a mother too. You knew better than to pack up your bags and leave her life the way his ex had left him. The worry you saw in those eyes blinked at you, begging for you to reassure him, to remove the nagging splinter that ached in his fingertip every time something brushed up against it.

“Jongin, I wouldn't do anything to hurt her. I’m just as attached to Nina as she is to me.”

It was the truth. You hoped he could feel your sincerity in your words because they were true. During this time together, you had grown to care for Nina, even going so far as to resent the silence of your home when you couldn't hear her laughter mingling with Nari’s.Everything about Nina felt comfortable and right and you couldn't quite imagine a world where she wasn't a permanent fixture in your home.

“And what about me?” He said suddenly, interrupting your thoughts with his quiet question that hit you like the kickback of a shotgun. You could almost feel the blow inside your chest and vibrating inside your ear drums. He couldn't possibly mean what you thought he meant with that question.

The blast echoed for too long, taking any possible response straight out of your mouth and tossing it across the room with what was left of your sanity.

“W-What?” Your head felt like it might be spinning and you looked down suddenly when you felt his fingertips brush lightly against the back of your hand. When you looked back up, he had taken a step closer to you.

“What about me?” He said softly, and he was moving again, another step, closer to where you stood you could feel the warmth of his chest against yours. The look in his eyes was different now. This wasn't the worry you had seen at the start of this hushed conversation in this dark hallway. This look was different. Raw and vulnerable you looked over his face, noticing the way his lips hung open, pouty and pink from where he had been chewing nervously on them earlier.

Your eyes were on those lips when he spoke again. “What if I’m falling in love with you?”

The world stopped spinning.  
In fact, everything stopped, your breathing, your heart beating, the past and the future, the heartache, the pain, the fucking laundry and that drawing made by a six year old who didn't know that despite how much you were allowed to wish for them inside your heart, you simply didn't say them outloud unless you wanted to scare them away.

“F-Falling in l-love?” Had you just said something? You must have because you felt the warm exhale of his breath against your face and his eyes weren't on your eyes anymore. He looked down at your mouth for a whole five seconds, you counted.

When he looked back up into your eyes you saw him nod his head. The movement was microscopic, just like the gradual way he learned into you, and inched his fingertips slowly along the palm of your hand until you felt those fingers slip in between your own.

“I’m scared,” he said against your face and you felt the puff of a small laugh from his chest with his honest confession.

“You scare the shit out of me,” he said with all traces of his smile gone and he was so close. He was right there, even if you had gone crazy and somehow didn't want this, there was no escape from those eyes, those lips and his other hand, not the one that was seducing you with mere fingertips, but the other one that had now reached out for you, slipping along your waist to the small of your back, you took a small step into him when he pulled lightly against you. He constricted that strong arm and you moved into him, feeling the overwhelming flood of his body heat over yours.

“Language, Jongin,” you said quietly because you couldn't help it. He had always been a stickler for language, being a teacher and all, he always said that it was best for him not to form those habits, lest he accidentally curse in class in front of the kids.

You saw the small smile on his lips a second before he leaned in and you felt the softness of those lips press up against your own.

With your eyes closed, the softness of his lips felt magnified.

He was motionless for one, two, three seconds before you felt the movement in his mouth and his lips parted, slipping around and over your top lip, you responded with your own movement.

When your mouth opened for him, his hands around you tightened and he pulled you harder into his body. When the tip of his tongue teased against yours and the deep breath he inhaled from your mouth brought with it a fresh wave of desire, the smoothness of his skin below his shirt made your fingers crave for more.

Your ears caught a sound.

A gasp in stereo and he heard it too, instantly pulling his lips away, he turned his head, angling his body away from the light to face that darkened hallway, you saw him reach his hand up to wipe the wetness from his lips.

You risked a look.

You saw two wide eyed little girls standing in the hallway just outside of Nina’s bedroom. Hands held and matching expressions of surprise on their faces.

“Uhh,” you managed to say, your voice sounded too thick for an honest chat with your children, you heard the man next to you clear his throat, probably in response to the sound of your own voice more than a need on his end.

He turned around, facing the children and you could see the pinkness in his face and the tremble in his hands as he crossed them over his chest for a moment, lifting a hand again to his lips, you saw him tap lightly against them.

“You see girls, when you get older--uhh” he said in an awkward sounding voice and his eyebrows furrowed as he winced at himself. Was he stuck? Did he actually have a plan here or was he just winging it? Because this didn't feel very well thought out to you. He looked at you with those wide awkward eyes and you opened your own lips to try and come up with something.

“Uhh, when two adults..l-like each other--” your own face changed, once those words left your lips you felt the wince that you were sure matched the expression you saw on his face.

You couldn't do this. You weren't about to have this conversation. Nope. No way. You stubbornly zipped your own lips shut and looked back at him with a small shrug that told him exactly how stumped you were about what to say to somehow explain what they just saw.

“Just...don’t worry about it. You’ll understand when you are older.” He said with an air of finality and he waved a hand at them, shooing them away, trying to get them to just drop the whole thing entirely.

All at once, and as if they were very much of like mind, their expressions changed from shock and you saw the beginnings of smiles forming on their small faces.

They turned to face each other and instantly embraced, jumping up and down with excitement and laughter.

“Yay! We’re going to be sisters!” You heard from one of them, but in the jumble of laughter and dancing you weren't sure who said it.

The girls jumped and laughed their way back into Nina’s room and you stood frozen in that hallway next to the man who was also frozen in place next to you. From the corner of your eye you watched him. He looked ahead where the two girls had disappeared, looking pink faced and shellshocked.

A buzzing that you heard drew his attention down and he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, looked down at the number on display for longer than necessary before he quickly left your side. You couldn't help but notice the look of tension you saw on the face that you had become so accustomed to.

You couldn't help the feeling that something was wrong when he went into his darkened bedroom and answered the call with a tense ‘Hello’ that didn't at all sound friendly.

The door was closed, but you heard it. You could hear the unmistakeable angry tones, too quiet to understand the words, but the _tone_. He sounded nothing like the sweet, warm Jongin you had grown to love.

The talking stopped abruptly and he didn't come out, not right away.

You waited, leaning against the wall of the hallway. You waited until you thought he might never come out. Finally your curiosity and your concern for him grew to overwhelming amounts and you approached his closed bedroom door with the smallest knock you could manage against the wood.

There was a breath’s pause before you heard a faint word from him.

“Yeah?” he whispered out followed by a cough.

“Jongin, can I come in?” You asked against the wood, your face against the seam where the door met the wall and you heard a bit of silence again.

“Yeah.” You heard and you turned the knob, pushing the door open you could see that the room was still dark. Your eyes adjusted easily, having spent enough time in the darkened hallway and you saw him sitting on the floor at the foot of his bed with his darkened cell phone in his hand and his face angled down.

His eyes were open but he was looking down between his knees at the floor.

When you reached where he sat you sat beside him, resting your weight against his shoulder.

“Sorry,” he said quietly and you shook your head, refusing his silly apology for being upset about whatever just happened in that phone call.

“Nina’s mother is in town and is coming to pick her up for the weekend tomorrow.” He had a defeated, monotone quality to his voice as he spoke, as if somehow he could control the feelings inside of him by controlling his own voice. You nodded your head silently, to let him know you were there, and leaned your head against his shoulder as you snuck an arm around his waist from behind.

You saw a movement in his face when he turned his head in your direction and looked at you from the corner of his eyes.

“She--” he said, interrupting his own sentence by biting down on his upper lip. When he let go his hands were rubbing over his face and he was speaking again. “She will be okay. She’s gone with her before. The worst that happens is she bribes her with all of the candy and presents she can afford and sends her back with her head full of stories.”

You nodded your head against, still leaning against his shoulder with your eyes wide on his profile.

He was talking to reassure himself more than you. What did you know about what Nina’s mother did when she took her?

“She will be okay,” you reassured and you knew it was probably true, but what you really hoped was that Jongin would be okay.

The next morning your phone beeped with a text from your ex husband’s assistant letting you know the time she would be around to retrieve Nari.

You gave your little girl a hug and a kiss, zipped up her backpack and made her promise to behave herself and you closed the door to the silence of your apartment. This was normal to you by now and no longer felt that calm after the storm sensation that you often felt right after the divorce. When the wounds were still fresh enough to fill you with resentment at having to share your little girl with that man. Eventually you made peace with the arrangement after a few times of Nari coming back with surprising tales of trips to the zoo, or the movies; things he never did with her when you were married. Things you always wished he would find time in his busy schedule for. But now that he had limited time with her, you noticed the small changes in their relationship that seemed to benefit Nari greatly.

Not long after your door closed and you made your way around your home gathering up loose toys and the occasional sock left on the floor when you heard a soft knock against your front door.

You rushed to the door thinking that perhaps Nari forgot something but when you pulled it open, looking down for her face you saw someone’s knees. You followed a path straight up, lingering on the two familiar hands that hung limply at his side and the toned arms that attached to those hands disappeared under the short sleeves of his shirt.

Jongin was standing at your door and his face was grim. He blinked slowly and wore a severe pout on his lips that seemed to cover his entire head in a dark cloudy mood that you were sure meant that Nina was gone with her mother and he had been sulking alone since she left.

You stepped aside, matching his frown and he stepped inside, removed his shoes and walked silently through your home toward your living room where he found your couch. You heard a groan and he let himself fall face first into the cushions and you held your palm flat over your face to suppress you reaction. He took up the whole thing, and rolled onto his side with both of his arms wrapped over his head and he let out a long sigh.

You had no idea he had such a capacity for dramatics like this, but strangely, the display seemed to fit him quite well. You risked a few steps closer to where he had deposited himself on your sofa, having his pity party of one, and you were sure he heard your approach because you heard him sigh again and mumble out some words you could just barely make out.

“I don't want to talk about it,” you were sure he said after replying the whiney sounds in your head a few times and you carefully positioned yourself on the tiny spot of sofa that was left just next to his head.

The couch dipped some and he lifted an arm from his face, glancing at you through half opened eyes. You smiled down at him and he closed his eyes again as he shifted himself. You felt him moving up higher, placing his head on your lap, you relaxed into the couch and let him wiggle until he got comfortable.

His arms moved around your back and you felt a pull as he pushed his face into your belly with the smallest moan.

You felt the moan vibrate inside your body and strangely it took a weird pathway up your spine and tingled at the back of your neck.

Why did he have to make a sound like that? Why did the weight of his head on your thighs and the breath spreading heat against your belly have to make your mind wander in that direction? Couldn't you just comfort a friend without immediately recalling the heated kiss you shared with him in his home yesterday?

You felt powerless against this man and you lifted your fingers to run through his hair slowly. Lightly at first, you used your fingertips to comb a path away from his forehead down his scalp down to the nape of his neck. You moved slowly, starting at the top again when you reached his nape, over and over and you could feel the firmness of his arms that held you tight against his face relax some. You could feel the steady breathing into your belly slow down and change after a while and you figured he must have fallen asleep.

You wondered if he slept at all last night, with all the worrying about today he surely had been doing.

He shifted his head in your lap, giving you a small glimpse of his pretty face and you saw the lines between his furrowed, worried brows. With your fingertip you trailed lightly over his eyebrow, traveling down the length to the edge, down to his cheekbone and you watched his face relax under your touch.

“Did you get any sleep last night?” You whispered into the space below you and he inhaled a slow breath.

You heard two small hums from back of his throat as he sounded out his response to you. No. He hadn’t. He also didn't seem to be asleep right now, just comfortable in your lap with your hands on him.

“Because you were worried about Nina?” You whispered.

He inhaled again and made the same sound as before, two small hums, answering no to your question.

Your focus remained down at his face and your fingers stopped the brushing through his hair as you pondered his confusing response. What other thoughts could jongin have running through his mind that would interrupt his sleep other than Nina’s visit with her mother.

“Why couldn't you sleep, Jongin?” Your whisper wasn't as soft now that you knew he wasn't asleep and you saw him squeeze his eyes closed tighter with the breath he took.

“Because.” he said with his eyes closed.

Was he really going to answer this way? Both you and him knew that the word ‘because’ was a cop-out of an answer. You knew he wouldn't accept that as a response to a question in his class and you definitely wouldn't accept it as a response to a question you asked your daughter.

“Because why, Jongin?” You prodded and he wrinkled his nose and peeked at you quickly out of one eye before he glued them shut again.

He shifted again, hiding his face against you again you felt the hot sigh against your skin underneath your shirt.

“Because of the way you say my name.” He mumbled against the fabric. “And the way you dance with me.”

You closed your own eyes as you took in his words. Their impact hit you hard, like an earthquake and you could feel that familiar humming inside your chest that made breathing feel difficult to do smoothly. You felt like gasping for oxygen when he spoke but you settled for the tiny inhale you took as you tried to steady yourself.

You felt his arm move behind you and he opened a hand and laid his palm over your back. With a small wiggle you felt him nuzzle his nose into you and he let out another sound from the back of his throat as he breathed in deep.

“Because of the way you look in my shirt.” His hand was moving and you felt warm fingertips push your shirt out of the way and his fingers danced against the skin of your back.

Your own breathing felt out of control very suddenly as he hit you with another aftershock. He breathed you in again.

“Because of the way you smell, and the way you taste.” He was moving now, you felt him rolling and pushing off of you and his other hand moved to hook fingers just under your knee as he pulled you into him--pulled you below him where he laid on the couch and the movement was swift enough for you to gasp out loud. Despite being underneath him now you could feel the tension in his arm muscles as he supported his weight just above you. The move surprised you enough to make you open your eyes and the view, just below his warm body was nothing short of breathtaking. How you would survive this man you would never know, but you felt completely overwhelmed by the view you suddenly had.

He sat up on his knees, pushing away from you. His eyes were open and he looked down at you. In those eyes you could see it, this was desire. You weren't the only victim of the earthquake and he must have decided that you weren't positioned quite right because you felt strong hands reach just below your thighs on both sides and he pulled you down, closer to him. Closer to where he kneeled in front of you and when you settled, you realized he was nestled right between your parted legs now.

Hot hands ran slowly up your thighs and you could feel warmth spreading over your head, down your chest, flooding through your belly and landing like a lightening bolt.

“Please tell me you want me as badly as I want you, because I'm going crazy here.” You couldn't quite form words, but you nodded your head and he was falling into you as you pulled the stretchy fabric of the shirt he wore over his body until he got the message enough to come to you .

You needed his lips again. That tease of a kiss last night wasn't nearly enough for you and he reached for you with his mouth, covering your lips with his own you felt the instant heat in that kiss. The desire that flooded through his mouth into yours felt like a fever consuming the both of you. His mouth sucked against your lips, your tongue, his teeth nibbled and those hips pushed in between yours legs. You could feel the heat and the stiffness between his legs below the layers of clothing he wore.

“Jongin,” you whined into his hair. The ceiling fan blew strands of his brown hair against your face and he was somewhere lower, his mouth tasting the skin below your chin, along your jawline and when he bit down lightly against your earlobe you sighed out a quiet whimper.

“Hmm?” He hummed though lips pressed against your neck.

“Too many clothes.” You heard a small giggle from him. The first hint of brevity since he'd arrived and he giggled as you whined and complained. When you squeezed your thighs around his waist and wiggled your hips, you heard a low grunt from him before he was pushing up from you again. This time he rose further, all the way up in the sky on those long legs you frowned from all the way down on that couch and he smiled wide.

He reached for you, his hands interlocking fingers between yours and you felt the pull to your feet. You gave into him. It always came too easily, giving in to Jongin.

“Take me to your bed,” he said with a small tug and you stumbled against his chest. His hands let go of your fingers and griped your face gently and you were pulled into him again for another kiss.

“I want to be naked and surrounded by your smell--” his lips returned, needier and more demanding this time, “--I want to smell you on my skin for days.”

If he wanted smell, you wanted skin. Your hands slipped below his shirt again, fingertips gliding along smoothness until you pushed it up higher and higher and suddenly the thing was gone completely. You felt greedy with your exploration of the expansive plains of Kim Jongin. Of course the guy would have well defined abs. That was so like him. The leanness of his body bent and flexed below your prodding fingertips and he giggled when you reached his flank, clearly ticklish in the tempting space around his ribcage. You had been traveling through your home as you explored him, shedding garments as you moved until you felt only the heat of his bare skin and the cool softness of your bed sent a shiver up your back as you were warmed from above by his body heat.

You felt other things as well. With each pass his lips made across your skin, there was the wetness of his tongue or the nibble of his teeth.

Was this real? You gasped out a tiny whine when you felt him playfully bite down somewhere over your thigh and he moved to the other side and did the same. Hot hands ran over your legs and you looked down at him through your half closed eyelids. You felt too affected by him already and the nervous anticipation of this flooded through your consciousness like a tsunami. You felt shaky yet certain. You wanted this, and he definitely seemed to want this and, when his hands slowed near that spot just between your legs, you felt the edge of his finger make a pass against you.

His smile was long gone, yet his eyes remained glued on your face and when he moved his hand again, making yet another approach you felt as if you might just die from anticipation. The build up alone was enough to make you pass out from how difficult it was to get enough oxygen into your lungs. He leaned his head down, placing a small kiss against the inside of your knee. You felt the pad of his fingertip slip inside your wetness and his lips moved higher up your thigh. Something bumped lightly against your clit and your legs trembled when you felt wetness between yours legs. You couldn't watch anymore. You were already too worked up by the time you felt the soft warmth of his tongue between your folds and way he worked his tongue against your clit made you feel like an unstable rickety shack trying to hold up to a hurricane. The suction from his mouth coupled with the flicking of his tongue quickly made you lose your mind and when he hummed against your skin you reached for his hair, gripping tightly with both hands you could feel yourself falling falling falling into that bottomless pit that was Kim Jongin.

You landed hard with a scream out, a tightening of your muscles around his head, a clenching of your hands inside his hair, and a trembling in your body that radiated from the inside. He was relentless. He didn't stop until every last bit of trembling in your body quieted down and his mouth changed direction, leaving behind your sensitive spent core for your hips, your navel, that spot just below the fold of your breast and in between them.

You were breathing much too fast and the hand you placed just over your chest did nothing to slow it down. He was too much. Everything about him was too much for you and when you peeked a single eye open to look at him his eyes were on your face. His lips parted and the tip of his tongue peeked out over his bottom teeth. He was breathing just as fast as you were, yet from the glance between his legs you could clearly see how unsatisfied he still was. He was rigid, a stiffness that matched the firmness you saw in his tensed muscles and you sat up suddenly as you reached for him.

Perhaps you pushed a bit too hard and the grunt of surprise you heard from his chest as he fell over onto the bed was evidence of the force you used but you didn't care. the bed was soft and he would be yours now.

You crawled over him and his wide eyes closed tightly the second you reached for his hardness. You heard a sinful moan when you squeezed a hand around the base of him and the shuddering gasping sound he made when your lips made contact with his head was encouragement enough to last a lifetime.

His hands flew to his face and before he covered the beautiful expression, you saw parted lips and quick breaths escaping through the grimace. He was struggling for control nearly instantly and you smiled because dammit, this was fun. His taste was salty, manly, and the smoothness of him slipping inside of your mouth, over your tongue as he tensed his thighs below the palm of your hand made you want to pull. Suction and wetness and a small moan and you felt strong hands grip you hard as he sat up. He held you by your shoulders and when you let go the look on his face was nearly manic.

“I swear to God, if you make me cum before I get inside of you I'm going to lose it.” The intensity you saw in his eyes matched the look you saw sometimes when he danced. It was concentration and determination and he pried you off of him with those strong muscles, you were moved carefully and placed onto the bed next to him. As soon as you were far away from him, and he was out of danger you tried once more to reach for him. The temptation was so great, he was right there. A tiny tick of his tongue as he caught you and you felt him reach for your hands and pull them up and away from him.

You pouted and you saw it, the smirk. That sexy fucking smirk that sent chills down your spine and a fresh jolt between your legs and he switched his hands, easily holding both of yours with a single hand you felt him between your legs. His body weight and his heat moved over you and with a knee you felt him push your legs.

His hips rolled and you felt him bump in between as he pushed. Definitely not inside, definitely nowhere near, but the small brush felt significant. Significant enough for you to wrap your legs around his waist and pull and he gave in, pushing harder between your legs, you knew he could feel your wetness against his hardness now. All he had to do was slip inside, yet he rolled with his hips again. The action made the muscles in his body flex and stretch and you felt mesmerized by him watching him while simultaneously impatient with his teasing.

“Jongin, please--” you pulled him into you again with your legs and his eyes were on your face.  
  
He gave a small smile, much too innocent for what he was doing to you and yet he still didn't give in. How could he be so strong? What was this self control? Was it merely for the sake of teasing you or was he actually going to make you beg?

“Please what?” A single eyebrow lifted and you wiggled your hands within his strong grip.

“Do it,” you said through gritted teeth and he dropped suddenly. You felt his breath against your neck, his hand released your wrists and moved to hold your face and lower, slipping over the sensitive skin around your neck with featherlight fingertips.

“Do what, love? What do you want me to do to you?” He pushed his hips again, lining up more you felt him slide within your folds, bumping against your clit and you gasped.

“Do you want me to fuck you?” He was moving his hand down between your bodies now and you nodded your head, unable to hold the eye contact. He was just too much.

You felt the head of his dick teasing against your entrance and he slowly pushed and pushed and you felt him fill you. How long had it been? You felt the stretch and you gasped at the fullness and he held very still with his arms around your shoulders and his face at your neck.

He suddenly came to life, pulled himself out of you and pushed in again, still too slow, still too fast, still too much. Time stood still in the moments when Jongin was inside of you, and when he pulled out and pushed in again his mouth found yours. The pace of his hips quickened and the dizziness overcame you in an instant. You felt your walls tightening and you wrapped yourself around him, pulling him inside harder. His pace was less steady, more shallow and the slickness you felt in his skin from the sweat made the heat rise in the bed to near uncomfortable levels. Not that you cared, you were lost in him. He was lost in you and you half heard a whispered question.

“F-Fuck, I’m -- can I cum inside of you?” You nodded as your brain remembered the pills you took daily, and you held him tight, refusing to budge when he tried to pull away and you felt your own tightening inside as you cried out. He was trembling with you, falling with you, crying out with you and he trembled and shuddered, pulsing inside as he came.

He released the breath he was holding and dropped closer to you for a moment. His breathing hard and heavy, you felt the heat building to sticky levels as you tried to catch your own breath.

Giving in to gravity he rolled off of you, slipped out and you winced at the mess that you felt between your legs. Before you could process too much of the discomfort he was wrapping arms around you tightly as he pulled you close to him. You felt his heat on you again and you gave up trying to cool down anytime soon because his mouth was back. His kisses moved over you much slower this time, sweeter and with a sleepier rhythm. The softness of his lips gave easily to your own and you could feel yourself falling harder and harder with each kiss.

Eventually he stilled and you could feel the weight of his arms as they relaxed their tight hold on you. You recalled the tiredness you saw in his face as he snuggled up against your belly on the couch earlier and seeing him falling asleep in front of you made you smile.

Perhaps you could just lay here with him. Perhaps the house cleaning and the laundry could wait. Perhaps you only needed the weight of his arms around you, that coating of sticky warmth that covered your skin was beginning to cool off under the breeze from the ceiling fan and you actually began to feel cool. You stretched, careful not to wake him from the quiet sleep he was now in, and you reached a few fingers out trying to grab the blanket that laid in a mess at the foot of the bed.

It was just within your grasp and you pulled, feeling the sudden blanket of warmth cascade over both of your bodies and you watched his face carefully as he furrowed his eyebrows in his sleep, then relaxed with a contented smile.

“Can you be mine?” He said in a half asleep whisper and you looked into his face for signs that he might have been talking in his sleep.

When his eyes opened you looked back at him with wide eyes for a moment before you realized what he had asked you.

As if you had any other answer in the world for him. You always gave in to Kim Jongin too easily. Your bright smile and exaggerated nod of your head was all he needed.

The contented sigh before he drifted back off to sleep was all you needed.

\--

The next time you heard those words from his lips was at least a year later. Despite the months of dating, the dances, the movies, the dinner dates and trips to the zoo with your girls. Despite the chicken, all of that chicken that you were sure you would soon grow tired of, yet somehow never quite did, despite the familiarity and the love declarations and the kisses, despite everything that signified the love you had with Kim Jongin, you still saw it in his eyes.

It was that look again. The look of shyness and uncertainty behind those beautiful brown eyes was back and this man who oozed confidence in all aspects of his life had the nerve to look nervous with you.

You wanted to laugh as you looked down at the ring he held out in his hand. You wanted to jump and dance and throw a party, but more than anything you wanted to grab him and shake him because of course!

“Of course I will, Jongin!” You reached for him before you reached for the ring and his face relaxed and you kissed away every bit of doubt you saw on that face.

Out of the corner of your eye, you saw two little heads peeking around the edge of the doorway. They both wore knowing smiles and as Jongin slipped the ring onto your finger you saw him reach into the pocket of his slacks and pull something out.

When he opened his hand you saw two necklaces each with its own twin heart pendants and you looked up into his face to see the sweet smile you loved so much.

“This one is for you to give to Nina.” He lifted one of the chains and dropped it into your open hand and you instantly understood. “This is mine, for Nari.” He said softly against your ear and you tried your hardest to keep your emotions in check. Again and again, his thoughtfulness surprised you.

So you both took your places and knelt in front of the girls as you asked for their blessings.

Their answers?

Of course!


End file.
